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'Why should he be shown any compassion?' Feds say dying Madoff shouldn't get early jail release

Over 500 victims had written to a Manhattan federal court judge to oppose early release for the 81-year-old Madoff from a 150-year sentence imposed in 2009, while only 20, or 4% of letter writers, supported it, prosecutors said.
Bernie Madoff pictured ahead of his March 12, 2009 guilty plea to a decade-long fraud scheme that cost investors billions. (Photo by Stephen Chernin/Getty Images) (Stephen Chernin/Getty Images/Getty Images)

Bernie Madoff pictured ahead of his March 12, 2009 guilty plea to a decade-long fraud scheme that cost investors billions. (Photo by Stephen Chernin/Getty Images) (Stephen Chernin/Getty Images/Getty Images)

Bernie Madoff should die in prison, federal prosecutors and hundreds of the fraudster’s victims say.
Madoff, 81, asked a federal judge for compassionate release last month, claiming he has kidney disease and less than 18 months to live.

But prosecutors say the reviled fraudster, who ran a massive $65 billion, decades-long scam, shouldn’t be released early even if the kidney disease kills him — citing letters from more than 500 of his victims.

In fact, his 2009 sentence of 150 years was meant to be a de facto life sentence, Assistant U.S. Attorneys Drew Skinner and Louis Pellegrino argued in a court filing Wednesday.

“Madoff, unlike other serious white-collar fraudsters, received a sentence he could not possibly outlive because his crime was exponentially more serious than even the most serious other offenses,” they wrote.

“Madoff’s crimes were ‘extraordinarily evil.’ His sentence was appropriately long. It should not be reduced.”

Only 20 victims supported the compassionate release, prosecutors said.

"I lost all my money and my husband of 40 years committed suicide because of his horrific crimes. As far as I am concerned, he should spend the rest of his life in jail,” wrote one victim.

Another victim, 84, described having to live off a small pension after Madoff’s scheme blew up their retirement plans.

“In view of the fact that he has had such an impact on my life, I have no sympathy for this depraved individual,” the victim wrote. "Why should he be shown any compassion, when he had none for his many victims?”

Madoff demonstrated “a wholesale lack of understanding of the seriousness of his crimes and a lack of compassion for his victims, underscoring that he is undeserving of compassionate release himself,” prosecutors said.

Despite his claims of remorse, the prosecutors wrote, Madoff gave a series of revisionist interviews from prison, trying to play off his fraud as a mistake that snowballed out of control.

The Federal Bureau of Prisons has agreed he fits the criteria for a program that permits compassionate release for some inmates if they have less than 18 months to live, but has turned the request down because it “would minimize the severity of his offense.”

In the filing, prosecutors noted that Madoff once lived extravagantly, using investor money to buy a $4.4 million Manhattan home, fund a $6.5 million loan for a home in Nantucket and to finance two yachts worth $11.5 million and the salaries of housekeepers and a personal boat captain.

Madoff’s lawyer, Brandon Sample, described the scam artist’s health as failing fast. He’s confined to a wheelchair, needing oxygen for shortness of breath and facing terminal kidney disease along with other ailments. In arguing for compassionate release last month, Sample called his client’s sentence “symbolic for three reasons: retribution, deterrence, and for the victims."

Source: NY Daily News:

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